Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 FTracer Oct 04, 2008 0:01:38	Warning, some spoilers below. Is this module's difficulty jacked up pretty higher than it should be? At start we had a party of six. A dragonborn paladin, dragonborn warlord ,warforged wizard, dwarf cleric, human ranger and a halfing rogue. All the encounters seemed to be tough then we almost had a TPK at the waterfall. We lost the cleric, paladin and I died, the wizard, covering the retreat. We gained a half-elf warlock, a human fighter and I rolled up a elf cleric. The rogue got killed a couple more game nights in, got resurrected then left the game later on due to the start of school. We've talked to some ghost, fought at a graveyard and returned back to the Keep to eventually defeat the big bad guy if we can get through the Hordes of Death. Pretty much in all of our encounters we get by the skin of our teeth. Quite a few times we've almost had another TPK. Granted not everybody uses their daily powers but I tend to blow all my powers trying to keep the team in one piece. It seems like the only thing keeping us for death is healing surges because the bad guys have more hitpoints, do more damage and have a better attack and defense that us. All our encounters tend to last 11-15 turns. Is the game supposed to go fast? Is this how 4th ed supposed to be?
#2 kouk Oct 04, 2008 0:41:35	That adventure in particular is generally regarded as pretty hard for newbies. The "waterfall cave" encounter especially, as it is actually a level 6 encounter consisting of hordes of enemies and one overpowered one. Considering you are probably still level 1 when you are supposed to fight it, it is kind of crazy. Also, if you made your own characters (you seem to have done so) then you will probably be a little bit more efficient than the premade ones. If anyone is using the pregenerated characters as-is, then you should look at the Keep on the Shadowfell Errata thread in my signature -- certain things are missing from them, or just incorrect. If you are new to the system, it will also be harder (of course). Monsters are much simpler for the DM to run even if he's new as well, especially when they have tactics sections detailing what to do and when. New players are not quite so lucky, their characters are more convoluted and figuring out what to do can be tricky sometimes. Here's some advice for players new to 4e: Don't underestimate anything in 4e, even "lowly" kobolds and goblins. Go with your Monster Knowledge checks. Don't try to work solo -- this game is built for cooperative play much more than 3rd edition. Everyone fighting something on their own is a recipe for disaster. Use your powers wisely, don't pull out the Encounter or Daily powers until a very desirable situation if you can help it, or a very dire situation and you can't avoid using them. Easy example would be not to use a Blast 5 encounter power when all you could hit is one of the 4 enemies -- much better to have your teammates work with you to maneuver them into a better position. Be very mindful of the environment, avoid rushing into open rooms alone and be sure to use environment to your advantage (cover, difficult terrain etc.). Don't neglect your Action Points. Remember you generally get a new one every 2 encounters, so if you are on the second encounter, just go ahead and use one because you will get another right after you finish.
#3 Shiftkitty Oct 04, 2008 1:21:35	Also watch what sort of things your attacks are targetting. Wizards target Will, Fort, and Ref waaaay more often than they do AC. Those numbers are fairly low for most monsters. Yes, 4e is a different critter. I'm crafting some solo adventures for 4e, designed for 1 player and 1 DM, but the published modules rely on teamwork more than the earlier editions. My group found the waterfall encounter rough, but not devastating. I admit they got some good rolls in, but they really fell into the teamwork aspect pretty quickly sometime in the middle of that fight. Once that happened, I knew Irontooth's actions were numbered!
#4 Neutronium_Dragon Oct 04, 2008 1:45:54	> Don't try to work solo -- this game is built for cooperative play much more > than 3rd edition. Everyone fighting something on their own is a recipe for > disaster. This is perhaps the most important point of 4E play. If everyone's thinking in terms of, "What can I do that'll be really impressive?" then you're going to have trouble. If you instead take your turns with the thought of, "How can I set the next person up to do something really impressive?" then you'll have *far* more success.
#5 kouk Oct 04, 2008 3:43:23	If you instead take your turns with the thought of, "How can I set the next person up to do something really impressive?" then you'll have *far* more success. Hehe, well ideally it's more like "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours."
#6 axterix Oct 04, 2008 3:48:51	Other than the Irontooth fight, it wasn't that bad when my group played it. Last fight was tough, partially due to how the module set it up and partially because our GM increased the difficulty because we were going through things pretty easily. But a tough last fight is a good ending. One thing worth mentioning though, my party was 3 characters for most of the adventure, expanding to 4 near the end. My feeling is that this smaller party size, once we got past the first bit, let us level faster and that in turn made things easier. Bit extra AC, HP, and to hit, plus treasure divided amongst less people, so better geared. Getting some extra feats early helps a lot too. For instance, my fighter gaining plate and tough made him a lot harder to drop than when he started, with just dwarven weapon training. So with a larger party, slower xp, you need more encounters before you can pick up the little feats and powers to add a bit of muscle to the characters.
#7 FTracer Oct 04, 2008 5:23:09	Yeah, I think we were at level one when the Slaughter At The Waterfall quest happened. RPGing isn't too new for us. Some have been gaming for years. I think we do an okay job of playing tactically but probably not Special Forces kind of tactics. We tend to concentrated fire on one enemy at a time. I suppose my biggest concern is that even the lowest of monsters have a much better attack and defense than we do. Every encounter typically runs most the night and leaves us sliced to pieces and using an extended rest. It's been getting old real fast.
#8 kouk Oct 04, 2008 5:50:59	I suppose my biggest concern is that even the lowest of monsters have a much better attack and defense than we do. Every encounter typically runs most the night and leaves us sliced to pieces and using an extended rest. It's been getting old real fast. I felt the exact same way when I was starting out with that adventure. But, there's a good reason for that feeling -- it is often true! That module is brutal, really. Kobold Dragonshields are level 2. Kobold Wyrmpriests are level 3. There is a solo level 4 monster (IIRC) which means it is equal to five level 4 monsters, when the party is probably just level 2. Many monsters are higher level than the party, as are many encounters. The best way I found to think about it is like this: You're newbie adventurers, and monsters are a serious, serious challenge to your newbie selves. Every step you take is life-threatening. In many ways, having past experience with an RPG is really a detriment to learning 4th edition, because of the expectations. You don't expect a Kobold or Goblin of any sort to be superior to a PC in any way -- but they easily can be in 4e. Traditionally what were mooks are now actual monsters that can take a lot of hits. The closest there is to "weaklings" are Minions, who go down in a single hit. But even then they are not something you would want to ignore for long, because their damage adds up fast. Playing adventures other than KotS I found encounters much, much easier/enjoyable in general. Part of it is being low level just sucks. You have almost no options and you are still the weakest you ever will be. There are not all that many interesting equal-level monsters, and nothing is really lower level than you (no 1/2 level critters anymore). As you get more powerful, and get more options via powers, feats, and items, your party will really take off and fights will feel like they "should," assuming the guidelines are followed. Experience will also teach you how to fight as a group better. I think KotS got a lot of things wrong for being an introductory adventure for 4th edition, and really gives it a worse image than it should have. Very over-the-top fights, very tactics-heavy situations that newbies can't handle well right off the bat, pretty weak treasure (I seem to recall even for the pregen characters, there was loot that nobody could use for any real reason, like magic hide armor that was a waste of treasure unless you had that supplementary Tiefling Warlord download character. Useless dropped items = weaker characters). It's almost as if large swaths of the adventure were made to make PCs feel small and weak. Now, maybe the goal was to make it seem like you're overcoming epic challenges, but they went a bit too far. Lots of groups have varying experiences, but I'm fairly confident the majority had frustrations a lot of times, at least the people I play with mentioned it (and I saw lots of complaints on the boards). However, now that you know it isn't exactly "fair," consider it a challenge to get through it rather than something perhaps unfairly stacked against you that you are just punishing yourselves with.
#9 rauric Oct 04, 2008 6:33:22	Our group has gamed for years and almost TPKd at the falls. Two people were left standing, the rest of us passed our death saves for several rounds. I think it was designed to show the critics that 4E wasn't too easy for the player. I did not care for the adventure and I realize that I am not a fan of premades as is. I will buy them from time to time to mine idea from them but will never use them.
#10 dirtyfrank Oct 04, 2008 11:12:54	When I first started running KotS for my friends nearly every fight was a TPK. There were about 7 PCs so I added a few monster to the encounters. They were struggling quite a bit so I left an encounter as is and still nearly TPKed them. I deduced that their tactics suck. During one of the fights they knock a dragonshield down to about 2 hit points then did not attack him for about 6 rounds. All they needed to do was sneeze on him but instead they chose to let the kobold chip away at their health. I had started to really notice that they were trying to act like 7 individuals. During the last couple of weeks there has only been 3 players (some had to leave due to personal obligations) and me as a DMPC (splug) and without adjusting the encounters we are starting to fly through the dungeon with little difficulty. The current group of 4 is much more efficient than the original group of 7. I don't really think that KotS is too hard at all. Since I am DMing I see the monsters defenses. Some monster may have a 20 AC but then they have a fortitude and reflex of about 14. I thought that it would be common sense that if you miss AC with a 19, and you have an attack that attacks another defense, then use a different attack. For a while I saw players using magic missile (and other attacks vs. reflex) and missing with high rolls. All the wizard had to do is us ray of frost and he would hit the monster with a roll of about 6 or 7.
#11 FTracer Oct 04, 2008 11:17:21	Thanks guys. We had a suspicion that the module might have been written well before the handbooks were finalized. I've been reading a lot of people love the new edition. We generally do but most of the battles have been a major turnoff. You're right Kouk, Shadowfell does an extremely POOR job at trying to sell a new edition to old and new players alike. We've asked ourselves why our earth anyone would want to be an adventurer due to the exceedingly high risk of death and the low amount of loot. We've had characters die plenty of times in other games which we understand but it seems like the deck is almost stacked against you. I'm curious. Our DM has bought the next module, anyone played it yet? I was wondering if it's just as hard as Shadowfell is. No spoilers please. Well, one I guess. Is there a place such as a town or city where one could buy the magic items out of the player's book? Just by the description of the default campaign it doesn't sound like one could cherry pick magic items they want so why put all that stuff in the player's book?
#12 FTracer Oct 04, 2008 11:19:28	Since I am DMing I see the monsters defenses. Some monster may have a 20 AC but then they have a fortitude and reflex of about 14. I thought that it would be common sense that if you miss AC with a 19, and you have an attack that attacks another defense, then use a different attack. For a while I saw players using magic missile (and other attacks vs. reflex) and missing with high rolls. All the wizard had to do is us ray of frost and he would hit the monster with a roll of about 6 or 7. We've noticed this too. Most of our attacks are against AC, it seems at the next level up we may need to trade some powers out.
#13 ciaran Oct 04, 2008 12:15:36	We got whooped a bunch and finally lost a striker at the waterfall too. She was replaced by a 2nd leader and although the fights have all remained tough (I sometimes run out of surges) we were never been quite as close to death once more healng was in the party. The end was easy compared to the waterfall.
#14 dirtyfrank Oct 04, 2008 16:32:43	There is a trick to the water fall. The party has 3 turns to kill the minions and the skirmishers. After this point the dragonshields, wyrmpriest, and irontooth join the fight. If the first wave is killed before the second attacks then the waterfall becomes an EL 1 encounter immediately followed by an EL 2 encounter (no rest but it is not all at once). If a party takes time with the first wave the second wave joins in and it is like activating two encounters at once. At this point the EL 1 encounter then becomes an EL 5 or EL 6 depending upon how well the first wave was being handled. Having a wizard and strikers helps get rid of the first wave. If the first wave is taken out quick enough then the water fall is a walk in the park.
#15 FTracer Oct 04, 2008 17:02:38	It probably would have help us more if our dice didn't fail when we needed them to come through. The DM rolls a mean d20 too. ;) I remember in that waterfall fight my wizard biffing two rolls that could have french fried the minions. There was no way we were wiping them out in three rounds.
#16 dirtyfrank Oct 04, 2008 17:14:34	My DM d20 rolls a lot of nat 20s, but because I roll my DM rolls behind a screen the players don't realize that it rolls just as many nat 1s (maybe more). The dice I use for the DMPC, that I roll in front of everybody, tends to roll more on the mid range of numbers. I usually get rolls that barely miss or hit so the players tend to see splug as slightly useful because he tends to not very often. I think I have rolled a nat 1 with splug once where my DM dice in those same encounters have rolled at least 15 nat 1s (if not more). Of course every thing goes back to luck because the game is based off of rolling dice.
#17 DKase Oct 05, 2008 2:03:42	The group I game with got through the early ambush encounters with out breaking a sweat. Even the last encounters of the module never carried the TPK threat. The Waterfall encounter was just brutal though. It seems like they wanted to initially expand it into a mini dungeon, but got pressed for space/time and decided to make it a staggered encounter.
#18 kouk Oct 05, 2008 2:35:43	An author was quoted as saying (or said himself, I can't remember) that the way it was initially set up, the waterfall encounter was not meant to be as hard as it turned out. Something about iterations of people looking at KotS and tweaking things made it like it is.
#19 bedeverekm Oct 05, 2008 4:07:44	The group I ran the encounter for had nearly wiped in every single fight, due to having no clue about tactics for 4th edition. Then, they got to the waterfall last week, and I was dreading the tpk that based on this thread was inevitable. They walked all over it. They had the rogue sneak in, and had a bit of idea about what was in there. They picked off a few in one corner through stealth kills (damned hard rolls that they aced, fair enough) and then they got the lot to attack them on their own terms, forcing the minions to bunch up for the wizard to Aoe, while they all used sensible attacks, and dropped the non minions one by one. They dropped the last of them with the last action of turn three, and then handled the next wave almost as easily. (The rogue who was tanking for most of it kept shifting back after his attacks on Irontooth, which made him unable to double attack even once. Damned annoying... :P ) The only thing that went badly for them was near the start of the second wave, the absent player of the party cleric arrived, (character had been run by another in the party) and just kept blasting away at one monster who hurt him once, ignoring people saying things like "You missed on a 14, try attacking this guy with power xxx, it'll give me a bonus to hit, and we can finish him". He's played WoW too much is all I can say... :P But in the end, a disastrous party that could barely manage an easy fight without having to stop for an extended rest each and every time, walked over what has been repeatedly described at one of, if not the, hardest fight in the adventure...
#20 JayM Oct 05, 2008 23:12:51	Is the game supposed to go fast? Is this how 4th ed supposed to be? Not really. Keep on the Shadowfell (and the next two) are very condensed adventures. They consist of a lot of tough fights in a very narrow sequence, designed so you can go through all three adventures in order. Thus you get a lot more of the one fight / retreat and rest loops. And of the three, Keep on the Shadowfell is the worst. Shoehorning in the sample material really cuts from the rest of the adventure. It really could use more and weaker encounters in the first section. Until your characters reach level 3 and get some magic items they don't have a lot of margin of error when things go bad in a tough fight. Jay
#21 kouk Oct 05, 2008 23:20:28	And of the three, Keep on the Shadowfell is the worst. Shoehorning in the sample material really cuts from the rest of the adventure. It really could use more and weaker encounters in the first section. Until your characters reach level 3 and get some magic items they don't have a lot of margin of error when things go bad in a tough fight. Jay I can't comment on the other ones, but I very much agree with more but lesser fights early. More small groups of kobolds or goblins, or some wandering monster packs. I would reduce the number of fights later on though slightly, they are pretty much obstructions to the adventure at that point.
#22 FTracer Oct 06, 2008 7:56:33	I think if they had thrown in more minions it would have given the earlier encounters an old school D&D feel and a confidence builder. Well I'm glad to know it gets better, I was worried.
#23 undrave Oct 07, 2008 16:38:08	I think KotS got a lot of things wrong for being an introductory adventure for 4th edition, and really gives it a worse image than it should have. Very over-the-top fights, very tactics-heavy situations that newbies can't handle well right off the bat, pretty weak treasure (I seem to recall even for the pregen characters, there was loot that nobody could use for any real reason, like magic hide armor that was a waste of treasure unless you had that supplementary Tiefling Warlord download character. Useless dropped items = weaker characters). So true. Its pretty harsh and the treasures kinda suck. Can you say Bashing Shield? That thing is so pointless... or maybe its just because I own Adventurer's Vault XD
#24 axterix Oct 07, 2008 19:44:18	I'm curious. Our DM has bought the next module, anyone played it yet? I was wondering if it's just as hard as Shadowfell is. No spoilers please. Well, one I guess. Is there a place such as a town or city where one could buy the magic items out of the player's book? Just by the description of the default campaign it doesn't sound like one could cherry pick magic items they want so why put all that stuff in the player's book? My dwarf is just starting that one now. It is okay so far, though I prefer KotS to it so far. And yes. As to why it is in the PHB, two reasons. First, the DMG suggests the players tell the DM what type of items they want, then the DM uses items from that list. And second, check the ritual section of the PHB. You can cherry pick what you want, up to your ritual caster's level.
#25 kouk Oct 07, 2008 21:58:31	I believe starting with Thunderspire Labyrinth, they moved away from pregen loot and make it so the DM has to choose what goes into it.
#26 dirtyfrank Oct 07, 2008 22:10:34	I believe starting with Thunderspire Labyrinth, they moved away from pregen loot and make it so the DM has to choose what goes into it. I can understand why KotS had pregen loot because it came out a month before the PHB. How would you expect the DM to pick and choose loot to place every where if he/she doesn't have a book with a list of items in it. When some of the new classes are released the so called "worthless" items will be very beneficial. The hide would be very important for a barbarian for instance.
#27 FTracer Oct 07, 2008 22:33:26	Ah...so the Adventurer's Vault is now the Sear's Christmas Catalog. If you're old enough, you know what I mean.
#28 axterix Oct 07, 2008 22:34:28	The hide is useful with the PHB, if it is the Hide I'm thinking of. My party's ranger wears it, loves it, has saved him a few times so far. The party wizard is looking into getting a set as well.
#29 dragonsblood Oct 08, 2008 2:05:20	When you made the PCs and calculated hit points, did you add the constitution MODIFIER or constitution SCORE? The PCs should have 20+ HP at level 1.
#30 FTracer Oct 08, 2008 11:02:52	Score. You wouldn't last long at all if you added the modifier. Some of the monsters are using attacks that do 2d6 damage.
#31 fodigg Oct 08, 2008 13:55:52	Let the PCs do a side-trek to earn some xp (kobold hall maybe?) to bump them up to Lvl 2 before they get to the Irontooth fight. We were okay with a party of 4 after doing that.
#32 kouk Oct 08, 2008 15:25:17	If the DM is amenable, a side trek could help yes. There are already some other encounters for it in Dungeon magazines, or other low-level adventures available. See my signature for Hidden Gems to get a long list.
#33 FTracer Oct 10, 2008 19:15:17	Yeah...we narrowly avoided a TPK last night. Our ranger made it out alive and dragged my stabilized body behind him. The rest of the guys had the choice of being captured or rolling up a new guy. I guess everyone did have a mix of powers versus different defenses. We've been playing rpg's for years so I doubt we suck that bad at tactics. So we deiced we'll try out a house rule that the monsters have half hitpoints and 2/3 exp.
#34 skalgrimm Oct 10, 2008 22:50:15	Let the PCs do a side-trek to earn some xp (kobold hall maybe?) to bump them up to Lvl 2 before they get to the Irontooth fight. We were okay with a party of 4 after doing that. Seconded. Using Kobold Hall (and two quests, as some PCs had a backstory that naturally suggested one, and other PCs actively looked for the other), my group will hit lv 2 at the Kobold Bandit encounter (the first one in KOTS). I'm much less worried about them surviving the rest of the adventure, though even then I'll throw in the side trek stuff, probably, to make sure they stay a little above the level encounter in KOTS. And there will be some way into the final encounter OTHER than climbing/falling down a chain! How the heck do the guys using this place get down there?
#35 Shiftkitty Oct 11, 2008 9:12:25	Yeah, don't get down there the way our fighter did. He had planned to do a heroic leap down into the room and demand the immediate surrender of the bad guys. I had already told him it was a long ways down, but I guess he didn't hear me. He threw the d20, hoping to make whatever roll I deemed necessary after the fact. (These guys get carried away a lot.) Well, he biffed it big time. His terror-inducing YAAAAAAAARGH! became a girlish YIEEEEEEEEE! followed by the sound of damage dice being rolled. The player grabbed a butter knife from the counter, sprawled on the kitchen floor, thrust the knife into the air and gasped "Had enough yet, you evil booger?"
#36 turalisj Oct 11, 2008 13:08:01	> Don't try to work solo -- this game is built for cooperative play much more > than 3rd edition. Everyone fighting something on their own is a recipe for > disaster. This is perhaps the most important point of 4E play. If everyone's thinking in terms of, "What can I do that'll be really impressive?" then you're going to have trouble. If you instead take your turns with the thought of, "How can I set the next person up to do something really impressive?" then you'll have *far* more success. Might be why my group hates 4E so much. Everyone there (myself included) is trying to 1-up another person. If the wizard takes out 3 enemies, I'll try and take out twice that, etc.
#37 globster Oct 11, 2008 20:54:10	I was actually about to start a "What are we doing wrong?" thread based on this, and then I saw this thread. Party: Warforged fighter (sword and board, optimized for defense), Halfing AD rogue, Human staff wizard, Dragonborn inspring warlord. We're all experienced roleplayers but fairly new at 4e, as is the DM. The teamwork is still a work in progress. We keep an eye on things here and are pretty familiar with the rules; the characters are pretty well built and certainly not gimped, and we have a general idea of what we're supposed to be doing. Fight going in to town? Rough, but not too bad. Ambush heading out? We all burned dailies and the wizard still got knocked down, although we rallied at the end. (It was looking like a TPK initially.) Outside the waterfall? No sweat due to the high number of minions and AOE but it could've very easily gone the other way. The wizard pretty much needs to fire off a Flaming Sphere if we're to survive, the fighter can't keep everything marked (and gets thumped if he does mark more than two dragonshields, even at AC 21), the warlord is constantly running from all the enemies that the fighter can't stick and the rogue is just sort of left picking up the pieces. We're pretty worried about this Irontooth character though, as the other encounters were supposed to be easy and weren't, and this one is supposed to be difficult. I'm guessing that it's going to be a TPK. A dedicated healer would obviously help but that's not an option, so what's left? To be fair, the DM threw more 20's than the entire party combined and the dice seem to hate us...but this is rough stuff regardless. There have been no easy encounters as of yet and we basically need an extended rest after each fight. I don't see how we're going to clear the kobold cave. This is normal? Reading this thread, I get the impression that this is not a good module. The DM bought it though and it wouldn't be particularly nice of us to refuse to play it. Other than blatantly cheating, what should we be doing to survive?
#38 dirtyfrank Oct 11, 2008 21:41:39	Party: Warforged fighter (sword and board, optimized for defense), Halfing AD rogue, Human staff wizard, Dragonborn inspring warlord. We're all experienced roleplayers but fairly new at 4e, as is the DM. The teamwork is still a work in progress. We keep an eye on things here and are pretty familiar with the rules; the characters are pretty well built and certainly not gimped, and we have a general idea of what we're supposed to be doing. The warforged fighter being optimized for defense tells me that the fighter would be best in a hallway or other confined area where it would be easy to restrict the movement of monsters. A defender fighters weakness is open areas such as the first fight and the out side the cave fight from KotS. The AD rogue should use the fighter to flank foes and to take advantage of the CA that allows the rogue to use sneak attack. A solid hit from a rogue, especially a sly flourish attack from an AD rogue, can usually take out about half of a standard monsters hit points. The flanking puts the rogue in an extremely dangerous situation and should delay and ready actions so that the fighter can engage and mark opponents before the rogue moves into position. The mark from the fighter will help protect the rogue from one opponent and the CA will allow the rogue to deal massive damage. The staff wizard, in my opinion is best if the wizard specks for close combat and takes leather and hide proficiencies. Anyways, the wizard should always have either scorching burst or thunderwave since these two attacks are at-wills that are great for eliminating minions. The wizard should focus on either the creature that the fighter is engaged with or an enemy that is attacking the rogue that has to sneak past the enemies front line for the flanking. Scorching burst is great for helping keep minions of of the rogue. The inspiring warlord should not be running but instead standing right next to the fighter. The inspiring warlord should have commander's strike and furious smash which should be used to make the fighter twice as deadly. If the warlord is running around then these powers are extremely useless and thus the warlord has made him/herself useless. If the warlord has become useless then the party is now operating at the same capacity as if a player is unconscious. Also standing next to the fighter the warlord should be able to heal everyone in the group. Also if the warlord is next to the fighter it makes it harder for the wizard to be attacked and killed. This being said the group has to look to see how to help each other out. If people get powers that have enemies grant CA, then the rogue can attack without flanking. Plus it also allows every one to hit the opponents better. If people get attack powers that immobilize, push, or slide enemies then the group needs to worry less about monsters swarming them. In 4E, if the group does not learn to complement one another's powers then the party is doomed to failure when faced with a tough situation.
#39 mazra Nov 07, 2008 15:37:40	Hi Everyone, We just recently took the dive into 4e. KotS is not broken! It is tough though and if the DM provides the player characters with some early Healing potions for cheap it may not be a bad idea. Reality is KotS may be the most fun you will ever have fighting Kobolds. Some of the battles are large and may take a while, but it can be very enjoyable for all parties. I have been very reluctant to venture into 4e. Now that I have, I like it. It is a truly revolutionary way to play the game. We are constantly having to retrain our thinking from 3.5, but so far so good. Btw for those complaining about 4e Wizards, I don't recall Wizards being very powerful early on in any of the prior versions either. At least the Wizard was key to the party's success at the waterfall in KotS. Later, Mazra
#40 Neutronium_Dragon Nov 08, 2008 8:34:21	> Party: Warforged fighter (sword and board, optimized for defense), Halfing AD > rogue, Human staff wizard, Dragonborn inspring warlord. One other problem: Unless the DM is scaling the opposition down, you're short-handed. The adventure is designed for a five-character group.
#41 Shiftkitty Nov 08, 2008 9:42:16	Call me a traditionalist, but you're missing a cleric. Those 4e clerics are some serious butt kickers. ME (dm): It howls in agony as your searing light courses through his body. It collapses into a heap of smoldering flesh, clearly dead. CLERIC: Huh, reckon I don't know my own strength! ME: Well, it did have Vulnerability Radiant 10. CLERIC: Well, HALLE-FRIKKIN'-LUJAH!!!!! Yeah, even the party has started saying things like "Yea, though we walk through the Halls of the Dungeon of Death we shall fear no evil for we have a 4th edition cleric with us!"
#42 phoenix512 Nov 14, 2008 0:19:35	I like DMing the kobold fights especially the one with the Slyblade (Dungeon #155) with its ability to redirect a successful attack from an enemy to an ally. The party makeup kept changing due people coming and going. I got to say that the party did pretty well with most of the encounters. Irontooth wasn't that tough except one person did go below negative and couldn't finish him off after bringing his HP so quickly. I was worried about if he was about die too soon. The tactics they did is what save them from the kobolds trying to flank them and get the bonus damage. They failed the skill challenge with Sir Keegan but managed to kill him with four members and none of them died. The only TPK was due to me messing around not because of the module. So I think the module work well.